She sits in my office, crying. “Why am I so depressed? Nothing terrible happened to me. I love my parents. I loved living overseas. I can’t wait to go back. But why do I get so depressed?”
I get out a stack of paper, and draw a tombstone on each sheet. On each tombstone, I write one of the losses she’s mentioned in passing. As I write, she remembers others.
And on the floor of my office, we memorialize a life of subterranean loss. We realize that every time there’s a major life transition—graduation, marriage, moves, births—there’s been an episode of major depression, as this mass of grief wells toward the surface.
So we sit with it. We weep, we mourn. We write, we talk, we pray. And God heals. He really does.
Some thoughts about TCK wounds:
- To be human is to be wounded. It’s part of the deal. We didn’t choose this gig, but here we are. And we’re not getting out of here without getting hurt–TCK, civilian, whatever.
- TCK wounds of loss and grief are a particular subset of the human condition of woundedness. There’s good research on this. (See Third Culture Kids, by David C. Pollock and Ruth Van Reken.) We might not like it, but there it is: our deal to deal with.
- Our TCK’s are losing their whole lives, every time we put our families on a plane. And sometimes none of us recognize it until years later, right about the time parents are thinking, “My work here is done.”
Some things that can help:
- Fix our own junk. Our kids have enough stuff. They don’t need to be worrying about mom and dad’s issues, too. Go first. Make it OK to be sad. To be mad. To be scared. To trust that God meets us in all those places, too.
- Let them have their own voice about their own story. It is way too easy for the Adult Standard Version to be the only version. Let the kids tell their side, even if it’s not how you remember it.
- Do it right. Take all the vacations. Have the family fun nights. Break “the rules” if it means your kids will be happier and healthier.
- If you think something is wrong, you’re right. Get help.
On our first furlough, we asked our kids to write something for our newsletter, and this is what we got. Our 5-year-old drew a picture of a boat. (Read, constant transition?) And our extroverted 7-year-old couldn’t figure out why people in America were inside their houses all the time.
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What emotions are you feeling right now, as you read this blog?
Sad, glad, mad or scared?
What emotions or behaviors are you seeing in your children that might indicate pain and grief?
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This guest post offered by Kay Bruner– MA, LPC-intern, former missionary to the South Pacific.
Please check out her insightful blog, where she talks often about Third Culture Kids and their unique struggles: Kay Bruner
